Mr David Olsen, what you have created here is AMAZING! I just discovered meerk40t yesterday and was very impressed, now I find it can pull this trick. Wow, just wow. Thank you for all your hardwork. If you can do this in your spare time, why haven't the people at lightburn figured how out how to do it? It seems to me there are more people with k40s than any other laser, they are a captive market.
They can. I've offered to basically do most of the work and explain the entire protocol for M2 Nano and made a couple videos exactly what it's doing an how it work, enough that some folks have managed to duplicate the M2 Nano protocol. Part of the issue is they sort of don't want K40 people, since their model is largely paying a hefty price for some software and then some additional money on a subscription basis after that for updates, and they feel like the costs of doing the troubleshooting and support for that set of consumers might not be worth their time. When you're paying $2800 for a Galvo laser you'll be falling over yourself to pay $100 bucks for better software to use it. When you're paying $300 for a K40 and another $80 for software it might seem like the software is much less of a deal. I raise the every year or so with Jason. I can't really say their motivations are entirely wrong here.
@@pietpompiepompiepiet940 Well all the stuff works in the trial version. There is a gcode version but it's a little bit lackluster. It's not terrible but, it's also not quite as mature. But, it's a better license and more compatible with other bits of laser software.
I'm glad I found you video, I had a quick try and it works.. Just a few issues to sort out when I have more time for example after I position the laser in lightburn and run the frame, when I start engraving or cutting , the laser moves to somewhere else on the bed. I suspect this is user error. This may save me a few hundred pounds as I may not have upgrading the motherboard.
Hi David I would like to know if doing this in the way you are explaining to be able to use LightBurn on the Board M2 Nano from K40 if you can also use RDWorks anyway, if so I would like an explanation for how to do it, if possible on video. Thanks strong hug Arthur Jesus
I have a RD6564F and I was wandering normally lightburn does not work with the controller the normal software is rd cutist Will this software allow me to finally use lightburn?
It is nice to know I have the ability to do this if I need to, but using Inkscape for my drawing, and Meerk40t for my burning and cutting works perfectly fine for me.
As well it should. Also, version 8 out since like yesterday lets you do some drawing directly inside meerk40t. For quick operations this can be really nice.
Interesting. I have lightburn licence, that I use with a diode machine. I think it's grbl. Do you know if would that work as well or do I need to purchase a licence for Ruida? Thanks
Just a question. Do you need Lightburn licence for RUIDA controllers? If the program emulates a Ruida controller hiw do you make the laser visible in Lightburn. Do you have a video on that? Thank you!
You would. However we're getting pretty good circa RC-1 to use `grblcontrol` in the same way and have the ability to pretend to be a GRBL connections too.
Probably depend on the version of the software you're running. It's a command in the console so, it differed from version to version. I think 0.7.x was the preferred version for it. Though 0.9.x might mostly work now (though with some caveats).
Does this still work in the latest version? Can you do an updated tutorial for connecting to lightburn I can't seem to make it work on mine (and for hooking up a webcam to better position text on objects inside the laser) 😁 in using an Omtech K40 bought just recently. Thanks and keep up the amazing work!!
But your machine tends to work a bit? It just doesn't work right? There's potentially a couple reasons for this. What version is your board? The M2 Nano version 4 seemed to go a bit weird in rare cases it's why there's an option in Config for "strict" which should force it to start from the same direction each time. This is similar to how the original Chinese software worked and how K40 Whisperer works. I tried diagnosing this with the one person I came across with a M2-Version 4 (most people have M2-Version 9) but I recommended to them that they should try Whisperer. Because if Whisperer works and Meerk40t doesn't it's a critical bug, I coded up "strict" but before I could get to the bottom of whether it fixed things the person with the board became a lifetime Whisperer user. github.com/meerk40t/meerk40t/issues/272
hello! i need a little help to understand a position problem, i got meerk40t and lightburn up and running, but my laser head loses his position on the table, when i start a job it moves way of, always close to left frame, and when i stop it and press home he is trying to go thru the left frame! i have tried to find a way to config the head and table but don't find a way, no problem with laserDRW or K40 whisperer. have you had this trouble? best regards!
You probably are trying to run the job in either `origin` or `relative position` which aren't really supported. You probably need to send absolute position files. If you can control meerk40t correctly and move things around and have it work reasonably with your hardware then you'd take the further step of allowing your meerk40t get controlled by the ruidacontrol stuff.
@@davidolsen1222 yes thats correct, i runned it at "relative position". thanks! i'll try with absolute position, i have been able to move around in both meerk40 and lightburn 'ruidacontrol' it was just when i started a job it went south, (changed the start position and so on) but i'll try again! thank you for your support! /Joel
Make sure that meerk40t can control your laser normally. Jogs around, and generally works. Then after running the loop, talk to your laser via `localhost` with lightburn or rdworks.
@@DwightStebner You would connect through localhost. You don't need to contact another computer, just your own computer. Say your laser is located at "localhost" it should find itself.
How would i get the LAser unter devices into Lightburn, as you have 1 selected, if i only have used K40whisperer before???? Or what drivers wouldi have to install. Thanks for any Help or information.
Mostly just get it working in meerk40t and then there's a couple ways to get meerk40t to be controlled by other software. There's a pretty extensive console command set and one of them `ruidacontrol` makes meerk40t pretend to be a networked ruida device which you can control with rdworks or lightburn. Though I'll probably also want/need the grbl controller thing to also work fairly well too.
Hi sir. I have problem when i use meerk40 with lightburn. I cannot adjust the power when I choose to cut or engrave different patterns. on lightburn software
I haven't fiddled with this much during the various tests. I think it worked for some of of the power setting but might not work well for the pwm power commands. You could try grblcontrol in RC-2 it should be fairly robust.
@@davidolsen1222 i just reinstall my window 10.then it work awesome. Thank so much. But when i try to use meek40t with the old tab with AMD chip run window 10. It not working 😁
@@tomy8148 Is it giving you a specific error or reason? Usually the windows version doesn't matter much and the chip, only whether python runs. You can check the various videos I have and get it to run from source which should bypass some of those constraints if that may have to do with the compiled version.
@@davidolsen1222 it have a notice that not found the python38.dll . I just install python38.dll but it's not woking. How can i pybass it? Whát' the video can i learn? Thanks sir
Same here. It will frame the drawing correctly but when Start is pressed the head goes left, makes a noise (though its not against the end stops or rails) and just fires in the same spot.
MeerK40t should give you a lot of information about such things. Check whether meerk40t alone can control the device first and foremost, then you can run `ruidacontrol -v` to listen in verbose mode to whatever is sent.
Update.. I have been using Merrk40t for several days now. The latest version of it and it's working quite well with my m2 nano board. Even though I have a 2 year license with lightburn I think I like this software better.
@@johnnygray162 There are some additional guides online. But, mostly you point lightburn to localhost and make sure you can control your laser fine with the software. And ruidacontrol will activate a program that interfaces. You can also, in console, type "channel" and do "channel open " for a couple of the different ruida control channels. This should allow some troubleshooting.
This is only really available for some DSP versions of lightburn. I should likely add in gcode emulation at some future date too. But, there's apparently different versions of lightburn etc.
@@okmatt346 It's in active production. The rasters work fine but there's likely a few other bits of the grbl protocol that aren't fully working. The hope is to have it done for 0.8.2 or shortly thereafter.
I previously thought this might be impossible to fix but I might have to revisit that assessment since I've come out with a couple more methods of doing rastering with a much more open methodology in 0.8.0 and I might have to look at the code a bit and see if it can be put in there. The issue is that the ruida code does not as a matter of course have a clear indication that it will be doing rastering. The M2 Nano tends to need this information in order to know it should use raster mode rather than cutting mode. I'll have to check as I might be able to more effectively correct that now with some new code changes. It might also be a lot easier to start this running on a rPi in 0.8.0 too. Lemme check.
Tried adding it and it seems like it's possible to detect rasterable blocks. The code is still a bit broken in the branch but detection is there. Hopefully maybe next beta in the 0.7.5x line. The ruida code wants movements like 3.92 mils which needs to be weirdly stepped to make that generally acceptable as a distance, it's getting there. github.com/meerk40t/meerk40t/pull/730
Hi David, Im using M2 Nano Board with MEEK40T. I find your video very interesting . I will try this new upgrade ihope it will work. Iwill let you know once I'm successful
The expectation is that you'd use lightburn or RDworks in UDP mode since you don't actually have a ruida device in this case. You're controlling an M2 Nano, but emulating a Ruida device locally. That emulation is only of a fake-ruida device via UDP ethernet mode.
Thanks for the quick reply David but being a total nob to this I'm afraid that's like a foreign language to me. Is there any way I can get a clear explanation of what I need to do to get this working? Thanks again
@@whpkld In Meerk40t there's a console, in console type "ruidacontrol" so long as the attached computer can control the laser the attached computer pretends to be a UDP Ruida device.
Mr David Olsen, what you have created here is AMAZING! I just discovered meerk40t yesterday and was very impressed, now I find it can pull this trick. Wow, just wow. Thank you for all your hardwork. If you can do this in your spare time, why haven't the people at lightburn figured how out how to do it? It seems to me there are more people with k40s than any other laser, they are a captive market.
They can. I've offered to basically do most of the work and explain the entire protocol for M2 Nano and made a couple videos exactly what it's doing an how it work, enough that some folks have managed to duplicate the M2 Nano protocol.
Part of the issue is they sort of don't want K40 people, since their model is largely paying a hefty price for some software and then some additional money on a subscription basis after that for updates, and they feel like the costs of doing the troubleshooting and support for that set of consumers might not be worth their time. When you're paying $2800 for a Galvo laser you'll be falling over yourself to pay $100 bucks for better software to use it. When you're paying $300 for a K40 and another $80 for software it might seem like the software is much less of a deal.
I raise the every year or so with Jason. I can't really say their motivations are entirely wrong here.
@@davidolsen1222godd day. Meerkat is working with my m2 nano but for lightburn must I have the dsp license or will it work with trail version?
@@pietpompiepompiepiet940 Well all the stuff works in the trial version. There is a gcode version but it's a little bit lackluster. It's not terrible but, it's also not quite as mature. But, it's a better license and more compatible with other bits of laser software.
I'm glad I found you video, I had a quick try and it works.. Just a few issues to sort out when I have more time for example after I position the laser in lightburn and run the frame, when I start engraving or cutting , the laser moves to somewhere else on the bed. I suspect this is user error. This may save me a few hundred pounds as I may not have upgrading the motherboard.
i have success connect meerk40t to device, but now the problem i can't connect M2 laser to Lightburn software
Hi David
I would like to know if doing this in the way you are explaining to be able to use LightBurn on the Board M2 Nano from K40 if you can also use RDWorks anyway, if so I would like an explanation for how to do it, if possible on video.
Thanks
strong hug
Arthur Jesus
I have a RD6564F and I was wandering normally lightburn does not work with the controller the normal software is rd cutist
Will this software allow me to finally use lightburn?
It is nice to know I have the ability to do this if I need to, but using Inkscape for my drawing, and Meerk40t for my burning and cutting works perfectly fine for me.
As well it should. Also, version 8 out since like yesterday lets you do some drawing directly inside meerk40t. For quick operations this can be really nice.
thanks for the info, this seems to be working.
where to download the software.. help please!
Interesting. I have lightburn licence, that I use with a diode machine. I think it's grbl. Do you know if would that work as well or do I need to purchase a licence for Ruida?
Thanks
No. But, yes. You can use GRBLControl just as easily and make the device emulate a grbl tcp device.
@@davidolsen1222 Thanks. I'm gonna look how to set up Meerk40t in Linux, as I run Lighburn from there as well. 👍
Is there a tutorial to show how to get this up and running?
hi how do i get the box at the bottom to type in. i am using v0.7.2s
i have a ruida controller in my k40 now i am building a bigger laser.
but this does look good
Just a question. Do you need Lightburn licence for RUIDA controllers? If the program emulates a Ruida controller hiw do you make the laser visible in Lightburn. Do you have a video on that? Thank you!
You would. However we're getting pretty good circa RC-1 to use `grblcontrol` in the same way and have the ability to pretend to be a GRBL connections too.
Ruidacontrol
Error. Command unrecognized: ruidacontrol?
Probably depend on the version of the software you're running. It's a command in the console so, it differed from version to version. I think 0.7.x was the preferred version for it. Though 0.9.x might mostly work now (though with some caveats).
Does this still work in the latest version? Can you do an updated tutorial for connecting to lightburn I can't seem to make it work on mine (and for hooking up a webcam to better position text on objects inside the laser) 😁 in using an Omtech K40 bought just recently. Thanks and keep up the amazing work!!
No. It's currently being worked on for the latest version. But you're a lot better off with version 7 or so.
Hello David
Is there any video how to setup mirk40t for my K40
I tried couple of times but my machine goes bananas
But your machine tends to work a bit? It just doesn't work right?
There's potentially a couple reasons for this. What version is your board? The M2 Nano version 4 seemed to go a bit weird in rare cases it's why there's an option in Config for "strict" which should force it to start from the same direction each time. This is similar to how the original Chinese software worked and how K40 Whisperer works. I tried diagnosing this with the one person I came across with a M2-Version 4 (most people have M2-Version 9) but I recommended to them that they should try Whisperer. Because if Whisperer works and Meerk40t doesn't it's a critical bug, I coded up "strict" but before I could get to the bottom of whether it fixed things the person with the board became a lifetime Whisperer user. github.com/meerk40t/meerk40t/issues/272
hello! i need a little help to understand a position problem, i got meerk40t and lightburn up and running, but my laser head loses his position on the table, when i start a job it moves way of, always close to left frame, and when i stop it and press home he is trying to go thru the left frame! i have tried to find a way to config the head and table but don't find a way, no problem with laserDRW or K40 whisperer. have you had this trouble? best regards!
You probably are trying to run the job in either `origin` or `relative position` which aren't really supported. You probably need to send absolute position files.
If you can control meerk40t correctly and move things around and have it work reasonably with your hardware then you'd take the further step of allowing your meerk40t get controlled by the ruidacontrol stuff.
@@davidolsen1222 yes thats correct, i runned it at "relative position".
thanks! i'll try with absolute position, i have been able to move around in both meerk40 and lightburn 'ruidacontrol'
it was just when i started a job it went south, (changed the start position and so on) but i'll try again!
thank you for your support! /Joel
I have the same Problem. A „Stop“ ruins all position settings. I try the other positions
Im Meerkat it says my controller is active...shows the ports. Lightburn does not connect to it, what needs to be done?
Make sure that meerk40t can control your laser normally. Jogs around, and generally works. Then after running the loop, talk to your laser via `localhost` with lightburn or rdworks.
@@davidolsen1222 yes machine works with MeerK40t. Lightburn will not connect. I have not ethernet or wifi on this M2 Nano board
@@DwightStebner You would connect through localhost. You don't need to contact another computer, just your own computer. Say your laser is located at "localhost" it should find itself.
@@davidolsen1222 ?
where do I find this local host?
How would i get the LAser unter devices into Lightburn, as you have 1 selected, if i only have used K40whisperer before???? Or what drivers wouldi have to install. Thanks for any Help or information.
Mostly just get it working in meerk40t and then there's a couple ways to get meerk40t to be controlled by other software. There's a pretty extensive console command set and one of them `ruidacontrol` makes meerk40t pretend to be a networked ruida device which you can control with rdworks or lightburn. Though I'll probably also want/need the grbl controller thing to also work fairly well too.
Hi sir. I have problem when i use meerk40 with lightburn. I cannot adjust the power when I choose to cut or engrave different patterns. on lightburn software
I haven't fiddled with this much during the various tests. I think it worked for some of of the power setting but might not work well for the pwm power commands. You could try grblcontrol in RC-2 it should be fairly robust.
@@davidolsen1222 i just reinstall my window 10.then it work awesome. Thank so much. But when i try to use meek40t with the old tab with AMD chip run window 10. It not working 😁
@@tomy8148 Is it giving you a specific error or reason? Usually the windows version doesn't matter much and the chip, only whether python runs. You can check the various videos I have and get it to run from source which should bypass some of those constraints if that may have to do with the compiled version.
@@davidolsen1222 it have a notice that not found the python38.dll . I just install python38.dll but it's not woking. How can i pybass it? Whát' the video can i learn? Thanks sir
Hi, where I find ruida 7.2?
Can you please tell me.
Do you mean MeerK40t 7.2 running ruidacontrol or something? Because Ruida versions don't work like that.
Works but any kind of image causes the laser head to get all jittery
Same here. It will frame the drawing correctly but when Start is pressed the head goes left, makes a noise (though its not against the end stops or rails) and just fires in the same spot.
A bit of the image issues should have been corrected in later versions. It should raster a bit better now.
This is awesome thanks, I can't get it to work lol, it says the laser is off. Any place where i can find any info on how troubleshooting it ?
MeerK40t should give you a lot of information about such things. Check whether meerk40t alone can control the device first and foremost, then you can run `ruidacontrol -v` to listen in verbose mode to whatever is sent.
@@davidolsen1222 thank you for the quick response, it does work in meerk40t. I just joined the FB group I'll post the log for the bug there.
Is it compatible with all M2 Nano boards?
Should be. It's just a emulator of ruida and sends it to any laser the software controls.
@@davidolsen1222 i will try it with the K40 i have just ordered. If it works i will be suuper happy
Where can i find this software to download please
Just google the name. Should take you to the github which has downloads in Releases.
Thank you Sir. I downloaded several versions of it but was unsuccessful linking it with lightburn for some reason?
Update.. I have been using Merrk40t for several days now. The latest version of it and it's working quite well with my m2 nano board. Even though I have a 2 year license with lightburn I think I like this software better.
@@johnnygray162 There are some additional guides online. But, mostly you point lightburn to localhost and make sure you can control your laser fine with the software. And ruidacontrol will activate a program that interfaces. You can also, in console, type "channel" and do "channel open " for a couple of the different ruida control channels. This should allow some troubleshooting.
hello
how can I add the Ruida device on light burn? when i select add device, the ruida doe not apear on the list
thank you
This is only really available for some DSP versions of lightburn. I should likely add in gcode emulation at some future date too. But, there's apparently different versions of lightburn etc.
@@davidolsen1222 is this something you have done yet?
@@okmatt346 It's in active production. The rasters work fine but there's likely a few other bits of the grbl protocol that aren't fully working. The hope is to have it done for 0.8.2 or shortly thereafter.
im doing this right now works great for cutting but when it goes to engrave it engraves wrong spot makes a racket any ideas plz
I previously thought this might be impossible to fix but I might have to revisit that assessment since I've come out with a couple more methods of doing rastering with a much more open methodology in 0.8.0 and I might have to look at the code a bit and see if it can be put in there.
The issue is that the ruida code does not as a matter of course have a clear indication that it will be doing rastering. The M2 Nano tends to need this information in order to know it should use raster mode rather than cutting mode. I'll have to check as I might be able to more effectively correct that now with some new code changes. It might also be a lot easier to start this running on a rPi in 0.8.0 too.
Lemme check.
Tried adding it and it seems like it's possible to detect rasterable blocks. The code is still a bit broken in the branch but detection is there. Hopefully maybe next beta in the 0.7.5x line. The ruida code wants movements like 3.92 mils which needs to be weirdly stepped to make that generally acceptable as a distance, it's getting there.
github.com/meerk40t/meerk40t/pull/730
Hang on, so this hack will cut but wont engrave?
Hi David, Im using M2 Nano Board with MEEK40T. I find your video very interesting . I will try this new upgrade ihope it will work. Iwill let you know once I'm successful
Hi David - any clues on how to get this to work via USB? Thanks
The expectation is that you'd use lightburn or RDworks in UDP mode since you don't actually have a ruida device in this case. You're controlling an M2 Nano, but emulating a Ruida device locally. That emulation is only of a fake-ruida device via UDP ethernet mode.
Thanks for the quick reply David but being a total nob to this I'm afraid that's like a foreign language to me. Is there any way I can get a clear explanation of what I need to do to get this working? Thanks again
@@whpkld In Meerk40t there's a console, in console type "ruidacontrol" so long as the attached computer can control the laser the attached computer pretends to be a UDP Ruida device.
@@davidolsen1222 tried the steps and data shows up in console but lightburn wont control any functions
@@imtack91 Did you find any fix to this? I'm in the same boat.
Mr. Please slow down. Maybe write down some bullet points before you go all Trump twitter on us.